Midnight
by ncistatelover
Summary: Another take on what happened on that rooftop 24th May 2005, with a darker ending but a Tate twist! Rating for violence/language.
Still sore, but strong enough to stand, Kate allowed Gibbs and Tony to help her up from where she'd been lying on the warehouse roof. Thankfully, the bullet that she'd taken for Gibbs had hit her and been caught immediately by the bullet-proof vest that she was wearing underneath her jacket. She remembered nearly not putting it on before she left, and was extremely grateful that she had decided to in the end.

As he helped her up, Tony's heart pounded in his ears so loud that he could barely hear anything that was going on around him. The beat resounded through his body obnoxiously and wouldn't shut up even when Kate was up on her feet and clearly alright (although slightly shaken). He didn't want to admit it, but in that moment when she'd gone down, he'd been more worried than he'd ever been in his entire police career. Though they fought like cat and dog, he had no idea what he'd do if anything ever happened to his partner. Tony thought the world of Kate, but he'd rather die than tell her that to her face.

"Protection detail's over Kate," Gibbs smiled, also ridiculously relieved that his agent was alive and well. His team was his family, and he took anything bad that happened to them in the field to heart, even if he never mentioned it to any of them.

"You did good," Tony added, grinning. His heart warmed as Kate returned this gesture.

"For once," his boss agreed, "DiNozzo is right."

"Wow," Kate chuckled sarcastically, "I thought I'd die before I heard a compli-"

At that moment, a speeding bullet came whizzing through the air out of nowhere and hit Kate square in the chest, narrowly missing her heart, just above where the bullet-proof vest ended. There was an ear-splitting, heart-shattering scream of pain as the tiny piece of metal shot through Kate's tiny body, piercing the skin on her back as it exited.

Tony had never heard a more agonising sound in his life as the bullet tore clean through his partner's flesh and continued on its way across the district as if nothing had happened; as if it didn't know that it had just broken someone who had previously been unbreakable. Though his heart was in frantic shock, now beating so loudly that he couldn't hear anything else, his brain forced his arms to shoot out and catch his injured partner just before her broken body hit the stone cold rooftop once again.

"Hold on Kate," he breathed, laying her down on the ground and collapsing down beside her as blood began to pour out of her two wounds quicker than he could react to it. "Hold on for me." His hands worked so quickly that they were a blur as he ripped off his NCIS field jacket and shirt, tearing the flimsy fabric to shreds. His heart went wild as he hopelessly tore strips of his clothing into makeshift bandages and bound the wound, applying as much pressure as both of them could stand. Blood soiled the 'bandages' as if it was laughing at his efforts, staining his hands and drying underneath his fingernails, sneering because it knew that in the end, it would win.

"T…Tony," Kate rasped, her breathing irregular and rushed, her body convulsing and trembling as her own blood bubbled in the back of her throat, slowly choking her.

"Don't talk," he gasped, sweat dripping down his forehead and landing in his lap, "you can't waste your strength, you have to hold on." He glanced frantically over at his boss, who was glaring solidly in the direction of a neighbouring warehouse, his sig pointed out in front of him as if he could see Kate's attacker from hundreds of metres away, while snarling hurriedly down the phone to summon the air ambulance.

"It's no use Tony," Kate choked between laboured breaths. Tony's gaze immediately snapped back to her and rested on her face, his eyes directly upon hers. He could see the sparkle that usually inhabited fading rapidly and there was nothing he could do to stop it. Her usually tan complexion was growing paler and paler by the second. "It's over."

"Hey!" Tony's voice shook, "Don't talk like that, you're going to be ok, I promise." He knew that the words were lies as soon as they left his lips. Deep in the depths of his soul, he knew that Kate's words were the truth- it was over, and that fact was killing him just as much as it was killing his partner.

Though Kate's dying body protested against any sort of movement, she raised her numb, shaking arms from her sides and used her weak hands to gently prise Tony's hands from the wound on her chest, intertwining their fingers together. Tony's heart was cracking straight down the middle, but he made no attempt to put them back on the bullet hole. Instead, he wrapped his protective arms around her, pulling her onto his lap carefully, wrapping his own jacket around her even though it made no difference to her ever decreasing body heat. New blood from the other hole on her back seeped through his trousers but he didn't do anything about it; he just held on to her as if he could hang onto the tiny thread that was her life for her.

Kate laughed again, a choked, air deprived, desperate sound. "Tell…Abby," she gasped, "that she'll have to take…McGee to the…spa this weekend…because…I'm otherwise…occupied…"

Tony felt hit tears pricking at his eyelids. The amount of blood that was staining his clothes and the ground around him was becoming ridiculous. Kate couldn't have 5 minutes left to live. Tears began to spill down his cheeks.

"I love you Kate," he sniffed, wanting to wipe his face of tears, but not wanting to let go of her, "please don't leave me, I beg of you."

Kate gasped as a huge tsunami of pain compared to no other swept through her body. It took so much effort for her to do so, but she managed to stretch her lips into a small smile. "I love…you too…DiNozzo…and I'm sure…your new partner…will…keep you…company."

Tony's heart snapped in half at this remark. Careful not to end her last few moments too early, he leant down and kissed Kate softly on the mouth-a kiss of longing for what they could've had, of finality.

As Tony pulled away, Kate gazed up at him silently, her breathing now slow and laboured.

"Kate, please stay," he pleaded.

All she did was smile.

"Secret Service Chick, over and out," she breathed, before she could breathe no more, her heart stopped beating in her wounded chest, and she slipped into eternal sleep.

The two halves of Tony's heart shattered into a billion pieces.

"Kate!" He yelled, shaking her gently by the shoulders. His voice cracked, tears now streaming freely down his face. "Katie, please wake up, please!"

Special Agent Gibbs whipped around at the sound of his agent's desperate cries, and instantly saw Kate's lifeless body lying across Tony's lap. The usually stone cold man's soulless façade shattered as he watched in a respectful silence as his 'son' drew Kate's body into his chest, cradling her back and forth, shaking as devastation ripped through him like shrapnel from an explosion. Tony buried his face on Kate's matted, bloodstained hair as he rocked her, whispering words that he'd never had the courage to say to her in real life.

"Tony," Gibbs started, but was interrupted.

"DAMN YOU ARI!" Tony screamed, "I'M GONNA KILL YOU- YOU BASTARD!"

Now Tony completely understood Gibbs' obsession with killing Ari. He'd meant every last word that he'd just said to Kate, and every last threat that he'd given the terrorist (or whoever was there to deliver it to him).

That murderer had better watch out, because nobody killed the woman that he loved and lived to see another day.

* * *

 **A/N: This is Midnight, the more tragic but Tate centered version of Twilight. I hope you like it- it was definitely different for my to write something like this, but I'm really happy with it!**

 **Louise :)**


End file.
